cannot derive from module class: new feature request

[Per Bothner]

Vladimir Tsichevski wrote:
> I'm trying to use modules as Java classes, so among other things
> I want to derive module classes module from module classes.
> 
> The problem is that kawa module classes implicitly declare a set of 
> apply... methods, and some of them are final.
> Redefining final methods is illegal in Java.
> 
> My feature request is as follows:
> 
> 1. As a minimum: make all module methods non-final. It takes to correct 
> two lines of code only.

I'm not opposed, but I wonder why you care, especially, given the
following request.  Why do you care about overriding the apply
methods, when you don't want them anyway?

> 2. As a maximum: provide one more module declaration to disable creation 
> of all stuff required for using
> the compiled class as module. The class resulted may be used as any 
> other Java class, similar to classes
> created with define-simple-class, but with more control over methods 
> visibility and scope. Moreover, no more
> extra class is required to keep static stuff when using 
> define-simple-class.

I'd rather improve define-simple-class.  For fields we already have the
mechanism with the 'option-keyword: option-value' syntax, and there
are some options already existing in Stk, Guile, or Common Lisp we
should just implement.  For methods, we could add support for options.
For example:
   ((methodName arg-list)
    allocation: 'class access: 'protected :: <return-type>
    body)
-- 
	--Per Bothner
per@bothner.com   http://per.bothner.com/